In a world gone mad here is the clearest yet photo of Pluto

24 June 2025

This is — if anything you read on social media is accurate that is — the clearest ever photo of dwarf planet Pluto. The original set of images used to composite this one were taken ten years ago, when NASA’s New Horizons space probe flew passed Pluto in July 2015.

By colour enhancing the image — Pluto doesn’t actually look quite so vivid — more detail is resolved, allowing for more information to be gleaned about the distant planetoid.

I’ve not been able to precisely ascertain when this image was first published. According to Project Ubu (Instagram page), in a post on Sunday 22 June 2025, NASA had “just released” the image. On hunting around, I found the same image on the Galaxies Instagram page, but they posted the photo on Friday 25 April 2025.

So the image certainly hasn’t been “just released”, I’d have gone for recently released. But enough being pedantic, let’s instead marvel at this incredible image.

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astronomy, photography, Pluto, science

On Falling, a film by Laura Carreira, with Joana Santos

24 June 2025

We order an item from an online retailer, submit payment, and a few days later it arrives in a box on the doorstep. Most convenient.

On Falling, trailer, the debut feature of Edinburgh, Scotland, based Portuguese filmmaker Laura Carreira, explores the lesser seen, behind the scenes, side of this ostensibly expedient process.

Aurora (Joana Santos), is a Portuguese immigrant living in Scotland. She works in a distribution warehouse, likely being paid below minimum wage rates, and at the end of her shift retreats to her single room apartment, where she lives alone.

On Falling is bleak drama, but the sort I like. The film premiered at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival, last September, and has been in limited release, mainly in Europe.

I can’t, as yet, find any information about a cinematic run in Australia, so this might be one to stream.

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film, Joana Santos, Laura Carreira

Firefox arrived with a bang, will it die with a whimper?

20 June 2025

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, writing for The Register:

As for Firefox itself, users are reporting a growing number of technical problems that have eroded the browser’s reputation for reliability. In particular, even longtime users are reporting that more and more mainstream websites, such as Instagram, Salesforce, LinkedIn, and WhatsApp Web, either fail to load or function poorly in recent Firefox releases. In particular, Firefox seems to be having more trouble than ever rendering JavaScript-heavy sites. Like it or not, many popular sites live and die with JavaScript these days.

According to Statcounter, Firefox’s market share peaked at almost thirty-two percent in December 2009. Statcounter’s numbers only go back to the beginning of 2009, so perhaps uptake of the Mozilla made browser was even higher earlier on. I migrated to Firefox the minute it launched in late 2004, at a time when Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE) all but had the browser market cornered.

People desperately wanted an alternative to IE, and Firefox delivered. Despite the experiences of others today, I’m not presently having many problems. WhatsApp, LinkedIn, and Salesforce are not websites I visit. I do use the web version of Instagram (IG), where I have occasional problems logging in. Sometimes I’m greeted by a blank white screen after entering my credentials, but this is usually resolved by reloading IG and trying again. Up until now, I’d attributed this difficulty to IG.

At the moment Firefox is the only browser I’m using on my Linux Mint setup, as the Flatpaks for Opera and Chrome remain unverified (I’m aware I can still install and use the browsers nonetheless). For whatever reason I was running Firefox, Opera, and Chrome simultaneously on my old Windows 10 setup. Little point my explaining why, suffice to say each browser served different purposes.

Firefox’s market share today, again, according to Statcounter, hovers at around the two to three percent mark. It’s a sorry state of affairs for a once popular browser, and I can only wonder if Mozilla will attempt to turn things around.

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browsers, history, technology, trends

Authors take to TikTok to prove they are not using Generative AI

20 June 2025

Alana Yzola, writing for Wired:

Criticism and warnings of Gen-AI authors snagging coveted deals are flooding both Threads and TikTok, with writers and readers sometimes flinging around accusations when they suspect someone is using AI as part of their creative process. Now, Aveyard and other prolific authors are not only calling out people who use AI to write, they’re also posting livestreams and time-lapses of their writing processes to defend themselves against such complaints.

The camera never lies. But will that be enough to convince book readers who otherwise suspect some authors are using AI tools to assist them write?

Astronomy Picture of the Day website turns thirty

19 June 2025

Administered by NASA, the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) website started posting images in June 1995. This is a time, that in 2025, feels positively prehistoric, when it comes to the web.

I’ve been looking at APOD on and off for maybe twenty years, and as far as I recall, the website has barely changed during that time. I don’t know for sure, but I suspect APOD has sported the same “Web 1.0” design since debuting thirty years ago. While the interface may not be much to look at, that’s not what we go there for: we’re there for the stunningly awesome images.

You can’t follow APOD on any socials channel, but you can subscribe to their RSS feed.

The infinite workday: more work hours and less employee privacy

19 June 2025

Microsoft is calling it the infinite workday.

Based on telemetry data, gleaned from apps including Microsoft 365, the American tech company has found the workday has been gradually becoming longer, and work-related activities are increasingly seeping into the weekend. This for people supposedly working Monday to Friday, between nine o’clock in the morning, until five o’clock in the afternoon.

According to some of Microsoft’s findings, workers are reading emails as early as six in the morning during the week. The same workers may still be on deck well into the evening, attending online meetings, called to cater for colleagues spread across multiple timezones. In addition, workers are more frequently checking email messages during the weekend.

So much for work-life balance, which I’ve always seen as a theoretical construct. Not for real. Bullshit. My workday looks tame by comparison. But the accumulation of the telemetry data used to compile Microsoft’s report is also concerning. Not only are people working longer hours, they are also being surveilled. Some degree — who knows how much precisely — of information about their use of various Microsoft software, is being gathered.

The case for adopting something like LibreOffice, an open source variation of Microsoft products such as Word and Excel, becomes all the stronger. This won’t rectify the problem of working extended hours and weekends, but at least workers won’t have large tech companies keeping tabs on them.

Upcoming Threads feature allows users to hide spoilers in their posts

18 June 2025

Meta’s Adam Mosseri, writing on his Threads page:

We’re testing a way for you to hide spoilers in Threads posts. When creating a post, highlight text or images and tap “mark spoiler” to blur it. People can reveal the hidden text or image by tapping it in their feed.

Mosseri claims no other micro-blogging service offers such a feature, and maybe he’s right.

If I weren’t doing the whole Indie Web/Small Web thing of maintaining my own web presence, I’d find the feature useful if I was using my Threads page to, say, write about film. I could safely include possible spoilers when writing my thoughts on a movie, knowing a reader would consciously need to click on the blanked out line of text, to reveal what was there.

This feature update reminds me it has been almost two years since Threads launched. I’m still using my account, sparingly, but it looks like some people have taken to using Threads like it was the website they never had.

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social media, social networks, Threads

Nine minutes no more: iPhone users soon able to vary snooze alarm intervals

18 June 2025

It should be six-thirty in the morning, on the east coast of Australia, when this post is published, but all things being equal, I’ll be slumbering for another ninety-minutes.

And when the alarm on my iPhone starts chiming, I’ll likely press the snooze button a number of times. I’ll be productive though. Reading and replying to email, and looking at news headlines. Every nine minutes I’ll be reminded I need to start the day in the not too distant future.

But some people’s morning routines might be about to change, following the announcement at WWDC 2025 last week, that the upcoming iOS 26 update, will allow people to set snooze intervals from anywhere between one to fifteen minutes.

I’ve been thinking about the potential of being able to change the length of the snooze interval, but am not sure if it’s for me. Anything less would be too often, and anything longer might be a little too spread out. But I think being able to change the interval period, even if only to a maximum of fifteen minutes, will be welcomed by more than a few people.

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smartphones, technology, trends

Linux, LibreOffice, offer an escape from Windows 11 and Microsoft

18 June 2025

KDE, developers of free and open source software, have launched a campaign encouraging Windows 10 (Win10) users to migrate to a Linux Operating System (this article is a good starting point), rather than moving to the Windows 11 (Win11) Operating System (OS).

Win11 stands to render many older, but still perfectly functional computers useless, after Microsoft recently changed the operating specifications for the OS. This means some older devices may no longer have sufficient capacity to operate Win11. The message from Microsoft seems clear: buy a new computer, or go without one all together. That could be a confronting choice for some people.

But as Sayan Sen, writing at Neowin, points out, there is another option, one that is also being backed by The Document Foundation, maker of LibreOffice, a suite of productivity applications similar to Word and Excel:

“You don’t have to follow Microsoft’s upgrade path. There is a better option that puts control back in the hands of users, institutions, and public bodies: Linux and LibreOffice. Together, these two programmes offer a powerful, privacy-friendly and future-proof alternative to the Windows + Microsoft 365 ecosystem.”

The Document Foundation also suggests Win11 is not quite as cost-free as is believed:

“The move to Windows 11 isn’t just about security updates. It increases dependence on Microsoft through aggressive cloud integration, forcing users to adopt Microsoft accounts and services. It also leads to higher costs due to subscription and licensing models, and reduces control over how your computer works and how your data is managed. Furthermore, new hardware requirements will render millions of perfectly good PCs obsolete.

They leave the best for last:

The end of Windows 10 does not mark the end of choice, but the beginning of a new era. If you are tired of mandatory updates, invasive changes, and being bound by the commercial choices of a single supplier, it is time for a change. Linux and LibreOffice are ready — 2025 is the right year to choose digital freedom!”

Regular readers of disassociated will know I migrated to Linux Mint about a year ago, and have been using Writer and Calc, the LibreOffice versions of Word and Excel, since. I won’t sugarcoat it: the move had its bumps, and I needed to make several tweaks to my laptop before the system stability I’d enjoyed on Win10 returned.

I also needed to start using some new apps, and had to give up on one or two I couldn’t find Linux compatible versions of (despite trying to use various Windows emulators), but was able to figure out workarounds. Today, I barely notice the difference. I open my laptop every morning and get working pretty much as usual.

If you’re having a problem getting started on — as it was in my case — Linux Mint, the Linux Mint Forums were a great help in the migration process. Chances are someone’s already run into whatever problem you’re having, and found a solution, which you can try. Otherwise, you can post a question asking for help.

Touch Grass by Mary Colussi wins Penguin Literary Prize 2025

17 June 2025

Sydney based Australian writer Mary Colussi has been named winner of the 2025 Penguin Literary Prize, with her manuscript Touch Grass. Going by this brief outline of the story, Touch Grass sounds like a work of speculative fiction:

Touch Grass tells the story of a depressed deletion specialist as she starts to leave her body at unexpected moments and finds herself at the surreal centre of a global panic.

Awarded annually, the Penguin Literary Prize was established in 2017 “to discover, nurture and develop literary fiction writers, providing a platform for new and diverse voices to emerge.”

Melbourne journalist and writer Chloe Adams (Instagram page) won the 2024 award, with the manuscript for her novel The Occupation, which will be published next month.

We’ll probably have to wait on a little while before learning more about the synopsis of Touch Grass.

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